New workings, Old Look

[02walshe]

Hi,

I've just recently upgraded my PC from Hardy Heron to Jaunty Jackalope (kubuntu) on the advice of the adept notifier. Don't me wrong on this, the KDE 4 looks good, but is there any way to make it look like my old desktop (KDE 3) without actually using KDE 3? I liked my old look so much more. (I'm one of those people who saw nothing wrong with the Windows 98/2000 look, and doesn't like vista.)

Can anyone help?

Thanks

02walshe

[Sissy]

Re: New workings, Old Look

I agree -- KDE 4 overall is pretty, but seems a bit less user-friendly. Having an option to switch to the KDE3.5-style menu layout would be fantastic.

I haven't figured out how to do it yet, but I'll let you know if I find anything...

[Sissy]

Re: New workings, Old Look

Hi,

I've just recently upgraded my PC from Hardy Heron to Jaunty Jackalope (kubuntu) on the advice of the adept notifier. Don't me wrong on this, the KDE 4 looks good, but is there any way to make it look like my old desktop (KDE 3) without actually using KDE 3? I liked my old look so much more. (I'm one of those people who saw nothing wrong with the Windows 98/2000 look, and doesn't like vista.)

Can anyone help?

Thanks

02walshe

I just discovered one thing that might help you. Right-click on the menu in your panel (the icon that looks like an arrow inside a blue circle). Select "Switch to Classic Menu Style". That, at least, makes the menu look like it did in KDE 3.

If you're looking to change the colors and such, I imagine there is a way to do that using themes/preferences, though I haven't tried.

Are there any other specific items in 4 that you're trying to get to look like 3?

[02walshe]

Re: New workings, Old Look

I Guess what I'm trying to say is:

How do I use my old KDE 3 desktop with Jaunty after the upgrade?

@ Sissy: Thanks for that tip. That's sort of what I was after.

I've also noticed a few of my apps are broken as well. I don't really know if that's to do with KDE upgrade or the Jaunty upgrade. There is also a slight performance degration.

[Sissy]

Re: New workings, Old Look

Sorry, I misunderstood your post. You want to switch back to KDE 3, but keep Jaunty?

You can probably install KDE 3, but I'm not sure if it would play nicely with Jaunty. I haven't tried it. Maybe someone else can offer some insight here?

As for the broken apps, you might try purging, then reinstalling them. Before you do that, though, I'd recommend checking the repositories to make sure the same apps still exist for Jaunty.

[02walshe]

Re: New workings, Old Look

No, When I made the post, I only wanted the look, but I think that the performance is starting to get me down. To be honest, I'm now going to say that this a performance issue. When I was using KDE 3, I had the Accessability options turned on, so when you press a 'lock' key, a window would appear. that was virtually instant. KDE 4 takes up to five seconds before anything happens. (I have a wireless keyboard that doesn't have any 'lock' lights)

Is there anything I can do to improve the performance generally?

[Sissy]

Re: New workings, Old Look

I can't find the accessibility options in the KDE 4 menu, so I was unable to replicate your problem there.

But, yes, I've noticed that in general things seem to be slower in 4. I'm not sure how to fix it, though. I've been using Gnome quite a bit more often myself until I can translate what I'm used to from 3 into KDE-4-speak.

Good luck...

[02walshe]

Re: New workings, Old Look

I can't find the accessibility options in the KDE 4 menu, so I was unable to replicate your problem there.

It's in System Settings -> accessability -> Modifier Keys

02walshe

[Sissy]

Re: New workings, Old Look

Ah. Perhaps it should be there, but in my System Settings I have only

General --> Network and Connectivity --> Sharing --> Desktop Sharing

and

Advanced --> Advanced User Settings --> KDE Resources.

Not sure what I did, but apparently didn't manage to get all of the KDE4 components installed upon upgrade. But anyhow, to get back to the topic at hand -- I haven't found a way to improve the performance in KDE4. I've seen a few posts saying that things seem to run faster, but I'm not sure I agree.

[02walshe]

Re: New workings, Old Look

Yes, I agree, too off-topic. I've opened a seperate topic regarding the performance issues, and other 'niggles'. See http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3103681.0.

The performance seems to be a real issue. I've got a custom build PC, that I built to spec, and that's now struggling after the upgrade.
With KDE 3, and Hardy Heron, I was OK. An upgrade shouldn't make you consider re-installing a downgrade. The performance is an issue.

ANYWAY, this topic is now considered closed, as I got my answer.
(But do see the performance topic!)

Edit: Maybe I was too hasty to close this issue! see below!

[KeithZG]

Re: New workings, Old Look

Closed? Don't close it yet! If you indeed want to be able to switch to 3.5 without downgrading back to Hardy, I can reassure you that it works fairly fine (there are a few niggles like KNetworkManager being bunk, but it's easy enough to use nm-applet instead). You can even have it co-existing with KDE4, and choosing to use the KDE4 apps that you like while sticking with the KDE3 apps when need be.

Just follow the instructions at here (the homepage of the "remix" and here (the Kubuntu Wiki article.

Myself I've been switching back and forth spending about equal time between KDE4 (shiny!), KDE3 (stable!) and LXDE (fast!), no big issues to complain about. That being said I *am* doing this on my so-so Core Solo -based 13" laptop, I've uhhh been playing it safe and keeping with Hardy Long-Term-Support Heron on my main, powerful desktop.

[Sissy]

Re: New workings, Old Look

Keith:

That's great to know; thanks for the tip! When I get bored with Gnome, I might give that a go. Although, under Hardy I had KDE4 installed alongside 3.5, and it occasionally got a bit confusing having both versions of the apps around all over the place.

Do the KDE4 apps play well with v. 3.5? (Other than, as you mentioned, KNetworkManager.)

edit: never mind, just answered my own question. Should have looked at the web sites first...